…which is why I’d like them to realize that they suck at atheism.
Etymologically speaking, A holiday is a holy day, which leads me to understand why the godless are so grumpy – they’ve never had one. But, then again, for a breed so bent on denying that religion has brought any good fruit into the world, they see no contradiction in eating it, so perhaps they go on holidays and call them vacations. Those wild, crazy, Winter Solstice Vacations. But when they leave do they say “goodbye”, etymologically rooted in the phrase “God be by you”? Surely that sends a shudder of hypocrisy down their spines, like when they write the date based on Christ in their earth-shaking blog posts; 2010. If they were real secularists, they’d have the stones to scrawl out “approx. 4,500,000,000 years” on the right hand corner of their high-school essays, and the teachers be damned if they can’t decipher the date. Well not damned literally, of course, but frowned upon by educated people, which as we all know, is much, much worse.
My point is Chesterton’s: Somehow one can never manage to be an atheist. They are shaped by the world, and the world is shaped by Christ. They are shaped by themselves, and there very selves are shaped by God. In this world where men become women and women become men, the hardest thing to become is secular. Even the word “secular” is religious, originally used to describe a priest outside of a specific religious order. The word “atheist” is no better. Anyone not asleep in 9th grade English class can tell you the meaning of the prefix “a” – without. And the without-god-ers do no more to disprove God than the without-arm-ers disprove the existence of arms.
Some highly intellectual and old-school discussion at the University of Paris.
The university system and liberal arts education were invented by the Catholic Church – that great monolith of indoctrination – so I assume no atheist attends higher education on principle, in the same way the religious are reluctant to attend the atheist’s educational counterpart – the Gulags. If they do go to college, my heart breaks with pity for them; how do they avoid the opiate of the masses? Not in the classes, for the history of science reveals too much about its illogical roots of being all “for the glory of God”, the history of music, language, farming, philosophy, writing, mathematics and just about everything reveals that we have monks to thank for just about everything. Even the Enlightenment, the perversion of which brought us the atheism itself. And 90% of alcoholic beverages. And as far as literature; after Nietzsche went insane and died, atheistic literature just hasn’t been all its cracked up to be, as evidenced by Hitchen’s “god is Not Great”, a rather extended diatribe that sounds like is written by an American teenager taking a break from playing World of Warcraft.
They could try descending into vice, an activity readily available at college, but they’d have to alter their cursing to exclude the best curses, and during pre-marital sex they’d be obliged to cry out “oh-my-infinitely-repeating-universe-theory!” which, I am told, does not endear oneself to the opposite sex. And, knowing that morality is completely relative, they’d have to be comfortable inviting their grandmothers to their frat parties. We have religion to thank for so much; the separation of church and state, limited government, protection of the weak and the poor, charity, hope, the end of slavery, the scientific revolution, the very best art and music the world knows, and atheism to thank for so little; besides oppressive communism, fascism, social darwinism, eugenics, moral relativism and internet forums so arrogant they might be mistaken for things of actual importance. So how does one go about being an atheist? I’ve honestly no clue, as I’ve never seen it done whole-heartedly. Maybe atheism, like a cubicle job, is only something that can be done in apathy, or just badly. So I do love atheists, I really do, if only for their inability to practice atheism.
At this point, I’d like to challenge atheists. Stop arguing with people who can’t argue. Winning a debate with a creationist and then making YouTube videos about how smart you are is a little like filming yourself taking candy from a child. What gain is there from bringing brilliant sophistry to Southern Baptists? I cannot count the number of articles, blog posts, forum discussions and videos I’ve seen ripping apart Protestant theology using the same logic the Catholic Church ripped it apart with 500 years ago. Christopher Hitchens looks great – and sounds wonderful, goodness I wish I had his mastery of English – debating evangelical preachers and slow-speaking bishops. But he starts to stutter, starts to slip when debating Dinesh D’Souza. So you really believe your atheism can hold up to the light of day? Prove it. Debate an orthodox, intellectual, Roman Catholic.